beat poetry
Cadenced spoken verse
Beat poetry is verse associated with the Beat Generation, the mid-20th-century American literary movement known for spontaneous composition, jazz rhythms, and rejection of mainstream values.
Writers like Allen Ginsberg and Lawrence Ferlinghetti became its most visible practitioners: She discovered beat poetry in college and it changed how she thought about form.
- free versePoetry without fixed structure
- stream of consciousnessNarrative mimicking uninterrupted thought
- coffeehouseEstablishment serving brewed beverages
- open micUnscreened public performance slot
- spoken wordPoetry delivered aloud
bebop · improvisation · rhythm · avant-garde · counterculture · howl · Allen Ginsberg · Jack Kerouac · on the road · City Lights · Greenwich Village · jazz · rebellion · bohemian culture · dharma · hipster · censorship · madness
- poetrypoem, poems, verse, verses, rhyme
- American LiteratureThe Great Gatsby, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Scarlet Letter, Moby-Dick, Moby Dick
- poetry termsrhyme, verse, rhythm, meter, stanza
- open micamateur night, comedy night, emcee, first-timer, five minutes
- poetry festivalopen mic, readings, workshops, slams, spoken word
- poetry typeshaiku, sonnet, limerick, ballad, ode
beat poetryNew Criticism
Text-autonomous literary analysis
traditional verse · Victorian poetry · metaphysical poetry · sonnets · villanelles
beat poetryProtestant work ethic
Belief that labor demonstrates virtue